对马尔萨斯人口论的批判与青年恩格斯的思想发展

Criticism of Malthusian Population Theory and the Development of Young Engels’Thoughts

在《国民经济学批判大纲》中,恩格斯对马尔萨斯的人口论展开了具体的分析与批判。马尔萨斯不去研究私有制条件下的竞争关系与穷人贫困之间的关联性,反而只是从人口的自然增长率与土地的自然产出率之间的差额的角度去谈论贫困的根源及解决路径问题,这是故意绕开了私有制的合理性问题。恩格斯明确地指出劳动力过剩决不是一种纯粹的经济学现象,而是由私有制条件下不道德的竞争关系所推动产生的政治—社会现象。他站在无产阶级政治立场上,从生产力的发展与私有制竞争关系之矛盾性的方法论层面入手展开了对自由竞争关系的批判。恩格斯在这一问题上的思想探讨,清晰地反映了他当时在私有制批判理论上的总体思想水平。

In Outlines of a Critique of National Economics,Engels made a concrete analysis and criticism on Thomas Robert Malthus’s population theory.Malthus did not study the relationship between competition and poverty of the poor under the condition of private ownership.Instead,he only talked about the causes and the solutions of poverty from the perspective of the difference between the natural growth rate of population and the natural output rate of land,which deliberately bypassed the rationality of private ownership.Engels clearly points out that labor surplus is not a pure economic phenomenon,but a political social phenomenon driven by the immoral competition under the condition of private ownership.From the perspective of proletarian politics,he criticizes the free competition from the methodology of the contradiction between the productive force and the competition of private ownership.Engels’thinking on this issue clearly reflected his overall level of thought on the critical theory of private ownership at that time.